


sharing spaces

by nereid



Category: Streets of Fire (1984)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-22
Updated: 2015-08-22
Packaged: 2018-04-14 21:00:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,227
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4579914
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nereid/pseuds/nereid
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Look, this Bonnie and Clyde thing, I’m not cut out for it.”</p><p>“What, you anti guns now?”</p><p>“No. The Clyde part. I do a mean Bonnie when I have to.”</p><p>[a car, a motel, an apartment]</p>
            </blockquote>





	sharing spaces

**Author's Note:**

  * For [galerian_ash](https://archiveofourown.org/users/galerian_ash/gifts).



> Hello, lovely person!
> 
> This was a great request, and I loved your letter, and it inspired me to write this fic. The Streets of Fire is definitely one of my all time favorite movies, and I'm v. thankful you were here and prompted this and that I got to write it. I hope you'll enjoy reading it!

"I guess this is my big chance, huh?" he says and she wants to punch him then, again. She wants to punch him a lot of the time, it almost seems like for most of what she's known him, she's wanted to punch him. She'll do it one of these days, probably. Not that she's planning their future together or anything. But she's driving the car and he's sitting in it, and she's feeling pretty sure that unless he jumps out of the car soon, she's going to punch him sooner or later. And she'd rather be able to do it sooner, too.

Her bones seem heavy and it's sorta hard to keep her back straight. This must be what folks mean when they say they're tired. It sucks.

His arm's draped over the frame of the car, she supposes this is what he thinks passes as cool and carefree, and if she hadn't seen him risk his life for an ex flame just a few days ago, she may even believe it. Well, not really, no. She's been around the block a few times, and she knows what she sees when she sees it, and she always calls things by their names.

"So, McCoy,"

"Yeah, Cody?"

"Why don't ya tell me your life story?"

She grips the wheel tighter.

"What, you give one melodramatic speech in your life and now you're already my therapist?"

"Nah, McCoy. You and me both know that'd never work. But it's a long road ahead, and we got time."

"I'm driving. You tell yourself a story."

She sees him shake his head out of the corner of her eye, and drives on. He says nothing for a while, and she's mighty glad for it.

The lights seem mostly to be working on this side of town, and she's glad for that. She'll probably be even gladder once they leave this damn place, but that's no reason not to enjoy it being well lit. It's almost nice, the wind in her hair, since she's taken off the cap and tucked it safely away.

“So.”

“So?”

“You were telling me your life story.”

“Oh yeah, Cody. Good shot.”

“Was there ever…”

“What?”

“Someone.”

“Someone?”

“Yeah.”

“Yeah, there was. Well, now I obviously know he wasn’t. Didn’t know it then, though, and damn, I wish I did.”

“What happened?”

“Nothing, really. He just wasn’t nice to me. Told me I was ugly when we fought. Kept buying me all these dresses I didn’t wanna wear. Didn’t like people refusing him, is all.”

“How’d it end?”

“Screaming. Blood.”

“Whose?”

“His. I punched him in the nose. Broken in two places, I heard later.”

“Nice”, Tom raises his glass and stops it mid-air, waiting for hers.

“Yeah, I do what I can to help, you know.”

They stop by a motel with a bar. She parks the car in the front of the bar, and leaves the cap in it. He bums a cigarette off a woman standing outside. 

“Don't even dream about asking me to dance, Cowboy“, she says when they enter the bar and Tom chuckles, which earns him a slight punch from her, just under the ribs, just enough to let him know she's not kidding and not hard enough to do any sort of damage. He'll remember it for a minute at the most, well, she’s hoping he'll remember it longer than that, but his ribs will only remember it for about 30 seconds. The army can make a soldier out of anyone, and neither of these two were exceptions to that rule.

They weren’t exceptional at all, come to think of it. Well, maybe in this bar, she was. But then again, she was exceptional in most bars. No make-up, no dress, not even a generic, straight from the racks skirt. Pants, a shirt, just like him, just like everybody else.

The army makes soldiers out of everyone.

They sit down at the bar. They sat at the bar most of the times they’ve met in a bar so far, and tonight neither of them wants to give any additional meaning to anything, doesn't want to change things, maybe not now and maybe not ever. Sure, he just walked out on the love of his life. Sure, he sort of found themselves in her car straight after, and now they’ve stopped for a drink and probably a room afterwards. Two rooms. Nothing different. By the book. Two rooms. She orders a shot of tequila for herself and he follows suit.

Of course, as it always happens, a number of tequilas later, words come out a lot easier. Tequila always does that.

“You know, Cody, you’re not that bad company.”

she says when they've walked over to the door to his room.

“Gee, thanks.”

“I almost regret my decision now.”

“Which one?”

“To not fall into bed with your type.”

Despite her words or because of them, she kisses him first, teeth and all. It seems more like fighting than kissing, probably, from the outside, and to be honest, it seems like a fight from the inside too. He's taller than her, which is nice, but not so terribly tall that it's uncomfortable, which is nice, too.

His hands are beginning to wander now, though. Admittedly, he seems careful, hands on her back, and not on her ass or breasts or crotch, but it's still handsy, too much too soon, especially when she's not even close to being sober, so she still stops it.

"Easy, cowboy.”)

She’s in her room in an instant, the door closed behind her, and he’s left on the other side of it. She can hear nothing for a few seconds more, and then, as expected, she hears footsteps, his, walking away, probably to his room, or to the bar, to get some more drinking done. Have to be an overachiever in something, right?

She feels cold now, which is uncomfortable, in all the places where his hands were before they left her body, but she knows this will feel better in the morning. It always does.

But the music was loud downstairs and she can hear it from here, and after all the shots she had, her head’s buzzing a bit and the room’s spinning just slightly, but she finds the bathroom without problem anyway. She takes a cold shower and afterwards, her head’s not buzzing anymore.

She still thinks of him when she falls asleep, even if she’d rather she doesn’t.

The next morning, they're drinking coffee in the bar, mostly alone since it's very early, and her voice makes her sound tired when she speaks.

“Look, this Bonnie and Clyde thing, I’m not cut out for it.”

“What, you anti guns now?”

“No. The Clyde part. I do a mean Bonnie when I have to.”

She gets up and says she's gonna go get her stuff, even if she's not sure he hears her.

In less than fifteen minutes, they're on the road again. She's letting him drive, and she's beginning to realize they need a plan, they need to do something, they can't just go around drinking. Hell, she'd be the first to sign up for that if it was an option, but it doesn't seem like it's on the menu.

She sees a sign on the road pointing to a town with a peaceful, safe sounding name and she points at it and he shrugs.

"Eh, why not?" he says, "I'm game if you are," and this time he has a hint of a smile on his face and playfulness in his voice, and she want to smile back, so she does.

A bar in this town seems to be looking for a bouncer, and they both go to talk to the manager, and because if there's ever been a god, he obviously hates her, because Matt Collins, her ex, is sitting in one of the booths in this place. Please, let him not be the manager. Everything else she's good with, but not this.

"Well, well," Matt says when he notices her, if it isn't my favorite woman in the whole wide world."

He sounds drunk, which shouldn't surprise her. It's him, even if the sun's not set yet.

She tries to ignore him, tells Tom to just go find the manager, but Matt leans over the back of the booth, looking in her direction, and he pulls her by the elbow to him.

She pushes him off, and he seems to be giving up, especially after she looks at him menacingly. She finds Tom at the bar, watching the scene unfold as Matt moves away.

"Who was that?" he asks.

“That’s my ex. The one I mentioned.”

“Well, McCoy, why didn’t you just say so?”

Tom walks away, and jumps over the armrest of the booth and lands just right to punch her ex straight in the face.

“Come on, let’s get outta here”, McCoy says, but she can’t say this didn’t make her the least bit happy. On the contrary. It’s sort of nice, having people to punch people for you. Though, she wouldn’t have punched him herself, probably. She thinks it’s maybe a good idea to learn to spare punches, save them, for later, or even for never, if you never find yourself needing them.

“I don’t need saving, I’m no damsel, Cowboy.”

“Never took you for one.”

“Then what was that crap?”

“You said he didn’t treat you nice.”

“So what?”

“Well, you should be treated nice”, he says and she’s not sure things are alright, both of them are shouting for some reason and she’s only noticed that now.

She doesn't kiss him. She thinks about doing it, though.

“I did fine on my own, ya know. I don’t need ya punching people’s faces for me.”

“Yeah, you can do your own punching, I remember.”

“Good.”

The problem with being smart is that you learn real quickly in life to deny things, even when maybe you shouldn’t.

Which is why by the time they've found a new motel to crash at, she's already sure she never even liked him. Actually, she's not even sure that they really kissed. Might have just been something she made up.

But she's not drunk tonight, she's careful not to drink more than one beer. And when they're standing in a motel hallway, similar to the one where they kissed last, she decided to go with the flow instead of against it. See where it leads her, for once.

“You just have to remember one thing, Cody”, she says and she’s back to using his last name, as a safety measure against something.

“This never happened”, she says and then she places her hand on the back of his neck and pulls him down to her and they’re kissing. When he doesn’t pull away, she opens the door of her room and drags him in with her immediately and without words – she’s never been one for avoiding inevitable things.

He’s not a gentle lover, which she expected, but she’s not gentle either, so it’s a good match, a bite for a bite and a scratch for a pinch and it’s like a competition, but in a good way, because really, there won’t be any losers here tonight.

The second time it never happens, well, it happens alright. And if he doesn’t leave her bed to return to his that time, well that’s just because his bed’s further than the one he’s in right now, obviously. And if she doesn’t move away from him when he remains in the said bed, comfortably near her but not all over her, well that’s just cause it’s a bit chilly in the room, that’s all.

The problem with being smart is that you learn real quickly in life to deny things, even when maybe you shouldn’t.

“You’re an idiot”, she says the next time she kisses him, still in the same motel. He jumped a guest too hard, and the guest punched back and they had to go get him stitched up. She punches him anyway, before the kiss, for good measure, so he remembers, maybe, not to be an idiot anymore. So they both remember that she’s not like the girls he’s used to, she doesn't do idiots.

When the time comes to rent a place, because they’ve been here too long to keep staying in a motel, there’s not even a question of whether they’ll be renting it together or not. And it’s probably good that there isn’t. Neither of them has ever been that good with words after all.

It seems sometimes to her, that there’s more bad times than good times with the two of them. But neither of them actually keeps score, and it only seems that way when they’re fighting, really, so she might be wrong. She usually is about this kind of stuff.

And it's not like either of them know how to this the proper way anyhow. Her only serious relationship was, well, it was, and Ellen and him, that didn’t end well either. Or it did, depending on the perspective.

All of this adds up to: they fight a lot of the time.

But they always stop fighting, too.

Once, and this is one of her favorite times, they’re fighting, and she start throwing things at him, and in between his pants and belts that she’s throwing at him out of his closet, her fingers find something harder, definitely not clothes. It’s a book with a silly title and a sillier cover, pink and blue wedding cake figurines and a title printed in bold, golden letters, “101 Step To A Successful Relationship”. His gaze shifts away from her, towards the window and then he sits down at the edge of the bed, looking at his feet or the floor or something. She laughs for a good minute before she stops, laughs because it’s funny, because it’s sweet, because it’s damn ridiculous, the cover of this book, and it’s so nice that he seems to want this to work so bad, he went and got a book. She’s still standing there with the book in his hands when he somewhat frantically gets up from his sitting position and grabs the book from her and walks out of the room with it. She finds it in the trash hours later, a few quiet hours later, seeing as they never talk much after they’ve fought, and since there was nothing in the trash but some cigarette butts and some dry crumbs, she takes it out and puts it in her closet. Two nights and some make up sex later, she brings the book to their bed with her and reads it aloud to him. He’s embarrassed at first, and she is too, but it passes. They laugh at the funny bits and stay silent at the bits that hit too close to home, but some of it sticks, even if neither of them would admit that without being subject to torture.

When her mother dies, she lets him drive to the funeral. She doesn’t cry in front of the gathered crowds. Her father doesn’t cry either, but he keeps looking like he could, just any moment now. The day after the funeral, around 11 pm, Tom’s helping her with some clean-up in the living room, and she leaves him alone to carry a couple of trays back to the kitchen. When she’s not back in a few minutes, he goes to look for her. She’s sitting on the cold kitchen tiles in her black, funeral pants. Her hair seems whiter than ever before, but it’s probably just the contrast. He doesn’t know what to say, so he doesn’t take a risk and he doesn’t say anything. He sits next to her until she gets up a few minutes later, and unceremoniously brushes the wet tears away from her cheek with her hand.

“Enough now”, she says, and if it’s meant for him, it certainly doesn’t sound it, partially because she’s looking at her hands while she’s speaking, and partially because she looks like she needs it more than he does. He gets up and follows her back to the living room.

She survives this. She even learns from it, she thinks. Not anything touching or silly romantic, like you need to stop wasting precious moments, or something else that probably gets written on greeting cards more than actually said by people. Instead, she learns that when she needs someone to sit on cold kitchen tiles next to her, he'll be that guy.

It's a nice thing to know.

Neither of them can say they’ve really learned all that much from reading the silly titled book about being a couple. One thing that did seem to stick with them was the rule about not going to bed angry. They’re still tempted occasionally to do it, sometimes when she comes back to their place smelling of cheap tequila and not wanting to talk about anything, which ends with him yelling which ends with her vomiting which ends with him refusing to be the guy who holds her hair while she vomits, which ends with him yelling “god damn it, McCoy” and she always knows he returns to her last name when he’s angry, which all leads to him slamming out the door after it, only to come back later. On the bad nights, when he comes back, he smells of tequila, too, and he has to hold on to a wall or two occasionally to be able to stay on his feet, and she’s not kind to him those nights, doesn’t coddle him and tell him everything will be alright, because they’ve been through these things one too many times for that kind of empty gesture to stick. She makes him coffee, though, on the somewhat bad nights, and it serves to knock them both back into reality. 

He gets restless, she can get that, because she does too. Doesn’t mean she knows how to handle either of their restlessness, and doesn’t mean he does either. But she’s usually calm by the time he comes back home, and they still don’t talk much then, neither of them willing to be the one to start, probably out of fear of saying something they don’t mean, or something they do. But she makes an effort to make coffee, and he brushes his teeth before he comes to kiss her while she’s making coffee. Neither of them says “I’m sorry”, because they’re soldiers, and soldiers learn first hand how little words mean, but he brushes his teeth and she kisses him back, and she moves closer to him when they’re lying in bed together later, and he puts his hand on her hip after he turns off the lamp on his bedside table, and he kisses her shoulder.

He doesn’t shave sometimes, and the stubble annoys her, even if it looks good on him. She never turns off the light when she leaves the room, and he never closes the microwave door after he takes something out of it. There’s good things, and bad things, just like there always are. And they don’t count them (they’re not the type to count, remember?), but they don’t have to. Math has nothing to do with it, anyway.


End file.
